Memorial of Saint Augustine of Hippo
Memorial of Saint Augustine of Hippo, Father and Doctor of the Church; One of the four most recognized Fathers of the Church known as the "Doctor of Grace"
“The measure of Love is Love without measure.”
“You made us, Lord, for Yourself, and our hearts will be restless until we rest in You.”
St. Augustine - converted with tears and prayer
The life and theology of St. Augustine has become a permanent part of the living tradition of the Church. There was a great passion and love for life in Augustine, a philosophical hunger for truth, good and beauty, but his heart was restless.
In dilemmas and spiritual confusion, the saint was accompanied by his mother - St. Monica. For many years she prayed persistently to God for the conversion of her son. One day, St. Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan, comforted her with the words: a mother of so many tears cannot fail to be heard by God. Finally, the unspeakable longing for God and Augustine's constant intellectual and religious search resulted in his encounter with Jesus Christ.
Augustine was born on November 13, 354 in Thagaste, in the family of a pagan father and a mother faithful to Christ, Monica, who, through heroic trust, asked God for the grace of Baptism for her husband who had been indifferent to the Christian faith for a long time. Augustine was attracted to the world and the desire to pursue a career as a rhetoric. He was educated in his hometown, and then in Madaura and Carthage. After ten years of teaching rhetoric, he went to Rome.
His metaphysical and religious anxiety led him to a Manichaean sect in which he found more rational than the teaching proposed by the Catholic Church. Augustine, educated in literature, read some simple sentences from the Gospel with some embarrassment. He has not yet discovered the beauty of God's Word. He continued to search for meaning and happiness in his philosophical quest and in purely human love. From 371, he lived for 15 years in an open relationship with the woman who bore him a son, Adeodatus.
Dissatisfied with his work, the lecturer of rhetoric in Rome decided to go to Milan, a very important intellectual center at that time. His ties with the Manichaeans weakened. He realized quite quickly that they did not answer the most important questions a person asks himself. He did not think that God had prepared a great surprise and gift for him in the person of the great Father of the Church, St. Ambrose, of whom he would soon become a diligent student.
He was delighted with the way Ambrose spoke, perfectly educated not only in speech but also in spiritual things. He met a saint who radiated the light of Christ. The rest was done by the Holy Spirit. In 386 he experienced a profound conversion that changed, his life - he was baptized with his son, becoming a man of prayer, in love with Christ. He no longer liked the way he lived, felt its emptiness and bitterness.
This inner transformation was also a time of spiritual struggle, which he described in detail in his most famous work, "The Confessions." He wrote them to give glory to God and to attract as many young people as possible to Jesus and His Church. Although almost 1,600 years have passed since the writing of "Confessions", they never cease to fascinate, deeply touching human minds and hearts. Augustine laments that he wasted too much time and experienced too much bitterness before discovering Christ:
Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new, late have I loved you!
You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for you.
In my unloveliness I plunged into the lovely things which you created.
You were with me, but I was not with you.
Created things kept me from you; yet if they had not been in you they would not have been at all.
You called, you shouted, and you broke through my deafness.
You flashed, you shone, and you dispelled my blindness.
You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew in breath and now I pant for you.
I have tasted you, now I hunger and thirst for more. You touched me, and I burned for your peace.
(Office of Readings, The Liturgy of the Hours, Volume 4, p.1357)
Soon after his son's conversion, his mother, Monica, died. Augustine describes his last conversation with her in a few pages. They are poignant pages full of the Christian hope for eternal life. In 396 Augustine was elected Bishop of Hippo. He was tireless in caring for his flock, which he fed with commentaries on the Scriptures and catechesis on the sacraments. He left behind a rich theological legacy, the most important of which is the "Treatise on the Holy Trinity", written for almost 20 years, in which he collected the most valuable achievements of theologians from East and West concerning the central Christian mystery. An important work of Augustine, written at the end of his life, is the book "The City of God", in which he described the spiritual struggle that takes place in every human community. "Confessions" are a testimony of an individual spiritual struggle, and the work "The City of God" contains guidelines on how to build a civilization of love in the social dimension, rejecting the civilization of death dominated by human egoism.
At the end of his life, Augustine experienced a tragedy. The Roman governor invited the Vandals to North Africa to defend themselves against the wild tribes of the Sahara. When he saw that the Vandals were no less barbaric than they were, he declared war on them. But it was too late. After their victory, the Vandals began to occupy city after city. Hippo defended herself heroically for three months, until the enemies managed to breach the wall and set the city on fire. Augustine died then. He died during the siege on August 28, 430. The Vandals forcibly introduced Arianism. Martyrdom's blood was shed profusely. 150 years later, Africa fell under the Arab hordes.Augustine's body was laid in the Cathedral of Hippo. Then, however, fearing the desecration of the Vandals, they were transferred to Sardinia, and finally the King of the Lombard,Liutprand (+ 744), transferred them to Pavia, where to this day the spiritual sons of the great bishop, the Augustinians, take care of the relics.
Several dozen volumes of his writings remain after Augustine. The most valuable of them are: “The Confessions” (386-387), “On the Catechizing of the Uninstructed”, (395), “Of Faith and the Creed” (396) and “The City of God”, 22 books (413-427). His 363 sermons and 217 letters have been preserved. So, he rightly earned the title of the greatest theologian of Christian antiquity. He is one of the four great doctors of the Western Church. Patron of Augustinians, regular canons, nuns, Carthage; printers, publishers and theologians.
Until Tomorrow
fr. george